Stand by for a media-driven panic. The recent murders committed by a teenage boy in Oregon will stimulate more anti-firearms rhetoric. Everybody seems to be asking "why?" There will be calls for more "gun control" and even outright prohibition of all firearms. Defenders of liberty and the Bill of Rights must counter the hysteria by focusing on fundamental issues. Here are some points that need to be made:

1.) We need to ask the correct "why" question about morality: Why did this teenage boy feel comfortable with hurting other people, when those people were not threatening him with any harm? The boy apparently lacked the strong moral conviction, the inner voice, that would tell him that it is absolutely wrong to hurt others except in reasonable self-defense. The Oregon incident, like the Jonesboro and Paducah cases before it, demonstrates the utter lack of a moral check on the desire to hurt innocent and defenseless people. These cases are not about guns -- they are about inflicting pain on others.

2.) We need to ask the correct "why" question about law enforcement: By bringing a deadly weapon to school, the teenage boy violated federal firearms laws, probably also state firearms laws, and school policies. Why didn't the school call the police, and the police arrest and jail the boy for those violations? [Unpopular gun owners who commit mere technical violations of gun laws get the federal treatment: they get raided, attacked, sometimes killed by federal agents.]

3.) We need to ask the correct "why" question about school policy: Why were the school officials and teachers totally unable to defend their students against a violent aggressor? Because of state and federal "gun control" laws, schools now guarantee that their students are sitting ducks for attackers. Attackers know that they will never face armed resistance in a school.

4.) We need to ask the correct "why" question about "gun control" laws: Why didn't the "Brady Bill," federal firearms laws, and state firearms laws, prevent this boy's crimes? If the laws prevent crimes, why not in this case? The answer is that the laws don't prevent anything -- at most they punish after the fact. "Gun control" laws ensured that the school kids were defenseless and undefended -- those laws made this killer teen's crime possible.

5.) We need to ask the correct "why" question about civil liberties: Civil rights organizations and political liberals have traditionally favored strong protections for persons accused of crimes, such as the "exclusionary rule," "Miranda rights," and limits on police search and seizure powers. The same groups have frequently supported rights for convicted criminals, such as extensive judicial appeals and comfortable prisons. But when it comes to "gun control," these same groups want to deny all Americans their fundamental right to keep and bear arms because of the crimes of a tiny minority. Why does this fundamental right, guaranteed by the Second Amendment and many state constitutions, receive no support when someone abuses that right and thereby causes harm?

JPFO members and other rights defenders must take the ideas from this alert and send brief letters to their local newspapers and legislators and governors. We need to beat the "gun prohibitionists" to the punch ... if we don't, we can be sure their lobbyists will be running unobstructed at full power.

Sample Letter to the Editor: (202 words)

Deliberate government policies have made the recent attacks on school kids both possible and easy. First, "gun control" laws and gun-phobia have discouraged law-abiding citizens from learning to use firearms, and often prohibit them from carrying firearms for defense. Violent criminals can assume the average person is defenseless.

Second, the federal government prohibits people from having guns for self-defense in or near any school. Criminals can safely trust that schools are undefended places to attack.

Third, the government has failed to provide police protection to school kids. The one thing government is supposed to do -- protect against violence -- it routinely does not do for schools.

Fourth, the courts have ruled that the government has no legal duty to protect anyone. Because they have no legal duty, government schools spend little or no money on protecting against violence.

After a rash of terrorist attacks on schools and other civilian targets, the Israeli government began to allow and encourage private citizens to carry concealed firearms. Terrorists promptly ceased attacking these civilian targets. Criminals and killers are scared of armed citizens. When American schools are protected by either police or armed private citizens, this recent spate of violence in schools will stop overnight.

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